Author: Web Master

When my son joined Team 980 in 2013 as a shy 13-year-old, I had no idea what the next 13 YEARS! would bring! Or how my life would change. To say that FRC is “more than robots” is cliche, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true. It’s also not just relevant for the students.

Yes, I came to understand just how valuable FIRST and the FRC program are for young people, whether or not they are planning on pursuing engineering. Yes, I made tremendous friends and joined a community founded on hard work, challenges and fun. Yes, I (I hope) helped shape young peoples’ lives and futures. But what surprised me the most was that yes, I also grew as an individual and team member, learning skills that I have taken with me to the rest of my life.

Well, that rest of my life is starting now.  My son and I are leaving Los Angeles and the day to day mentoring of Team 980, but I remain a ThunderBot at heart and Thunderstruck will also get me going.

Thank you, good luck and also strive to Walk Like Woody.

Robin Dorfman

Today was pretty fun! We had many new members coming in who, initially, weren’t sure what to pick (Fab, design, etc.). So, after a quick tour of the space, our mentor Robin decided to have them sort parts for Fabrication. It took us a while to sort the parts generally by what they were, and then we got into the nitty-gritty and started sorting by size, all while talking about school and our other weekend plans.

After that, the entire team convened to discuss team business and safety protocol. Our mentor, Andrew, also showed us a video explaining the Crescendo 2024 game and let the 2024 Championships Final 1 video play as he described the teams and their strategies!

Next was lunch, which consisted of boxes upon boxes of Domino’s Pizza, salad, and lemonade! We split into groups at different tables, and then it was back to sorting parts, designing, and programming.

Controls started arranging the robot’s electronic parts on cardboard. Programming had coded the general path of our robot in the first 15 seconds while it was still autonomous, but still needed to program when the robot had to pause! The Design team was planning the gear design for a tilted shooter, a note collector under the bumper, and drawing the drive base with 80/20 aluminum beams.

That’s all that really happened this meeting. We’ve only got a few weeks until our competition, but we’re making good progress! 🙂

— Hannah, member of Business in Team 980

Hi everyone!

We’re finally back after six months! Sorry for the bizarre blogging schedule; we’ll try to keep it as consistent as possible.

The school year has started, so we’ve been getting more serious about working on robots and getting the ball rolling. Just yesterday was the JBHS Club Rush, and we got 13 sign up signatures!! The BHS club rush is coming up too, so we hope to get even more students interested.

If you’re want to know what it’s like as a new member on the team, here’s my experience so far:

Prior to joining Team 980, I worked with Legos, tiny robots, and Scratch block programming in FLL. But now, I’m in a massive workspace with soldering irons, drills, and bandsaws, so forgive me if I’m not writing about everything; it’s all new to me!

Even so, all the team members and mentors have been very welcoming and understanding. I’ve been given a quick tour around, have peeked into the team’s snack bin, and have watched as other people discussed different parts while they modeled a robot. Another member of Fabrication, Zoe, even let me try using the soldering iron (under her watchful eye, of course).

I’ve joined the Business team and started working on updating the website/rewriting things with Mia, who’s a part of Controls & Business. We’ve been delegated with the task of keeping this blog up to date, so hopefully, you guys will get timely updates about everything going on here! I’m really excited to continue being a part of this team and eventually go to competition!!

— Hannah, Member of the Business Team on Team 980